Oilpressure

The title of this post might lead you to think it is about fans getting fed up with the barrage of negative news regarding the NTT IndyCar Series. Sadly, that is not the case.

If you’ve been coming here for a while, you may remember a post I wrote about a friend of mine whose nickname was Bubba. If you’re not from the south, you probably chuckle every time you hear the name “Bubba”, as it probably conjures up stereotypical images of what most people have of southerners. Having lived in the south all my life, I usually cringe when people from other areas make jokes about overalls and no shoes, that we have all heard over and over. Believe me when I say, Bubba was no “Bubba”.

My middle brother has four tickets to the Indianapolis 500 sitting next to me, but he doesn’t go every year. When he doesn’t go, I sell his tickets for him, so I can have a say-so in who sits with me. 2014 was one of those years. My usual suspects all turned me down, so I offered them up on Twitter and Facebook.

Bubba and I were fraternity brothers in college at the University of Tennessee. He was a couple of years younger than me. I would not classify Bubba as one of my best friends, but we were always good friends and we never fully lost touch any time after college.

Even though I had not seen Bubba since 1995 (he lived in Memphis and I lived in Nashville), we would talk on the phone two to three times a year and we always knew the high and low points going on in each other’s lives. When Facebook came along, it was a lot easier for us to keep up with each other.

Bubba saw my offer on Facebook and immediately called me. As it turns out, the Indianapolis 500 had been a bucket-list item for him for decades. Like me, his father had introduced him to the 500, and it was a ritual of his childhood to watch the race every year. That ritual spread into his adulthood, but I never knew that the whole time I was in college with him.

I also didn’t know that he had become a regular reader of this site. As it turns out, Bubba had been a closeted IndyCar fan for years. When he saw me repeatedly posting links to this site on Facebook, he began to read it and it rekindled his interest in IndyCar. When he learned there was an opportunity for four decent tickets at face-value, sitting with someone he knew – it was too good to pass up. He bought the four tickets and used three of them, for Bubba and his two boys – whose approximate ages were 11 and 13.

I am always excited to expose new fans to racing, and hopefully convert them into permanent fans. It was exciting enough to see Bubba’s face when the cars were on the grid prior to the race, but the thrill his kids were exuding was palpable. Sometimes you see adolescents at the 500 and you can tell they would rather be anywhere but there. That was not the case with Bubba’s children. They appeared to be absolutely enthralled with everything they were experiencing – the same for Bubba.

Bubba and his kids had an absolute blast throughout the day, which was capped off with an epic duel between Ryan Hunter-Reay and Helio Castroneves, with Hunter-Reay coming out on top. Bubba and his kids were on top of the world. When we talked the next week, I could still tell Bubba was beaming even through the phone. He asked if he could be the first one to offer them to, whenever my brother decided not to use his tickets. That turned out to be the very next year, but Bubba’s family had a conflict and he had to pass. He was available the following year, but that was the 100th Running and my brother used them.

The scheduled finally worked out in Bubba’s favor in 2018. He bought all four tickets and this time took the whole family – his wife included. I had never met her, and sometimes wives do not share the same excitement as the husband and kids. That was the case in my family. While my father and my brothers loved going to the race every year in the 60s and early 70s, my mother did not share the same excitement. She basically put up with going for a few years, but after the 1969 race – she decided she had had enough. She left it to us to enjoy, while she stayed home. I wondered if Bubba’s wife was going to be indifferent about everything or if she would share her family’s enthusiasm. At the start of the race, she had a look of amazement on her face. After the race, she told me it was the most incredible thing she had ever seen.

COVID got in the way of Bubba’s next planned trip to IMS. Unfortunately, life got in the way as well. Bubba and his wife divorced. It happens, as I know from personal experience. It hurt him to talk about it, so I never really pushed him on what exactly happened. As best I can tell, it was simply one of those cases where they both just grew apart. That’s similar to what happened to Susan and her ex. My divorce was a little more colorful, but I won’t get into that here.

When Bubba and I talked the last couple of years, I would intentionally keep it light and I think he wanted it that way. Our conversations mostly centered around racing and football. We still talked a couple of times a year and swapped texts every couple of months. He texted me throughout the weekend of the Music City Grand Prix this past summer, and he had plans to attend it next year for the season finale. I last heard from Bubba when he texted me on my birthday in October, when he was ribbing me for turning 65 even though he was just a few years behind me.

This past Tuesday afternoon, I got a call from a mutual friend telling me that Bubba was found dead on Monday in his home in Memphis, due to a medical issue. The odd thing was, I had seen a Facebook post from Bubba on Monday night that was time-stamped just a few hours earlier. I started to comment on it, but didn’t. Apparently he had already passed away by the time I saw it.

As you can imagine, I was stunned when I got the news. The shock soon turned to sadness, because I knew that he carried a burden the last few years. Even when I knew him over forty years ago, Bubba was always passionate about everything he did. He was passionate about the Tennessee Vols, sports, his family and life in general. He loved jazz, a lot more than I do and was always up for having a good time, as you can tell from this photo of Bubba (center) at the 1984 Kentucky Derby.

Susan took this photo of Bubba and me at the 2018 Indianapolis 500. It turned out to be the last time I ever saw him. I’m sad that he’s gone and I feel bad that the last few years of his life were not as joyful as most of it had been. But I’m glad that I was able to be part of his bucket-list item and he even got to experience it a second time four years later.

The NTT IndyCar Series and the Indianapolis 500 lost a fan this week, and I lost a longtime friend. As I said earlier, I never counted Bubba as my best friend and he would say the same thing about me. But we were good friends and maintained contact with each for over forty years. He was someone you could always count on, and quite frankly – it was easy to take him for granted. But now he’s gone, just like that.

As I grow older, this is becoming more frequent. You’d like to think you’ll never get used to it, but unfortunately I’m seeing it enough that I no longer feel stunned most of the time when it happens. This one bothered me, though. Maybe it’s because we’ve maintained a friendship for so long, or because I know he was hurting for the past couple of years. I think it is also because there are very few people that I’ve known that long, who I got to experience the Indianapolis 500 with. It’s probably all of the above.

Please keep Bubba and his family in your prayers. Bubba was a very dedicated family man, and his family was his life. Rest in peace, my friend!

George Phillips

This entry was posted on December 15, 2023 at 4:02 am and is filed under IndyCar. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.